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We went to bed last night after news of the 2a>stabbing of revellers at Jerusalem’s Gay Pride parade2b>. The attacker was a man who, ten years ago, had been jailed for attempted murder at the 2005 Gay Pride parade.

We then woke up to the news that 1a>a baby had been killed in an arson attack1b> by Israelis on Palestinian civilians.

It's very hard to put the last 48 hours into context. The first ever pre-camp at the European Maccabi Games has given everyone involved plenty of food for thought. Many questions have been asked, with one recurring theme - how, why and most importantly, never again.

No sooner had we set off the plane in Berlin than we were heading to the Olympic Park. You can almost touch the history of a place that was rocking with controversy in 1936 when the great Jess Owens wrote his place in the history books, again all the odds.

It was a first visit to the city for myself and a significant number of the Team Maccabi GB delegation who were clearly taken aback by tales of the atrocities in the trips to follow.

My father is Jewish, my mother is not. She never converted, probably because my Dad has never been particularly religious – in fact, you could probably count on one hand the number of times he has been to shul since his bar mitzvah.

I spent my childhood partly in London, where I was born, and partly in Vancouver, Canada, where my Dad is from and where he moved the family when I was eight. I’m the eldest of four, and one of my sisters, who is two and half years younger than me, also converted to make herself “officially” Jewish the same year I did, 2006. Being dual citizens, we have both split our time between Canada and the UK over the years, so while I did the conversion in Canada, my sister did hers here, at West London Synagogue. Interestingly, when my sister reached the Beth Din, she was told that because of her Jewish background, she could be given an “affirmation”, rather than a conversion – a precursor, perhaps, to the Reform movement’s formal announcement this week.

Growing up, despite the fact that my parents weren’t religious, I always identified as Jewish, because we spent so much time with my father’s family (all Reform). I have vivid memories of Rosh Hashanah dinners at my grandfather Asher’s house and seders at my great-uncle Abel’s house. But even more than that, it just felt like something that was a part of me: I have always gravitated towards Jewish culture, food, humour and music – I love Woody Allen, Jonathan Safran Foer, Matisyahu and of course, bagels. It troubled me greatly that despite feeling this way – despite having a Jewish parent and being, frankly, more than a little neurotic, I wasn’t allowed to claim my Jewishness because I was from the wrong side of the gene pool. I was forever being told – by Jews and non-Jews alike — “oh, your mother isn’t Jewish, so you’re not really Jewish.” It was hurtful, even if they didn’t mean it that way.

Today marks exactly a year since I graduated from the University of Birmingham. My first year as a graduate has not been anything like I imagined it would be but somehow I managed to get to where I hoped I would be by now.

While my social media accounts are filled with graduation photos and sentimental statuses, I fondly reminisce about my time as an undergraduate and how my experiences helped me in graduate life. Although I didn’t graduate with the coveted 2:1, I am excitedly waiting to begin my Masters in Newspaper Journalism at City University, London in September.

University was incredibly fun and I’m still in touch with my friends – despite all returning to our own ends of the earth. I always look back with nostalgia but the graduate world isn’t so bad either. So with a year of wisdom behind me, these are the most important lessons I have learned:

It’s every Jewish parent’s worst nightmare 1a>to lose a child, especially needlessly1b>. That sadly was my experience on 26 April 2009, when my wonderful 21 year-old daughter Hester, a medical student at Sussex University, was given a legal high. She wasn’t a drug taker, but a cheerleader and student mentor. Instead of surviving to become a doctor she went to sleep after an awards dinner and never woke up. Tonight, the House of Lords is hearing the debate on the Psychoactive Substances Bill.

We all want our children to stay safe and well so that they live to thrive to lead happy and fulfilled lives. These days’ young people face many challenges during their teenage years and the party substances known as ‘legal highs’ are top of the list of pitfalls as many believe they are safe because, until now, they have been legal.

In 2010 I founded the Angelus Foundation in Hester’s memory, to raise awareness about the dangers of ‘legal highs’ so that young people can make informed decisions and parents can have wise conversations with their children.

It was as hilarious as it was true. The fanatics, with their stereotypical skinheads and warped thinking, were an anachronism, completely out of place opposite the established democracy of Downing Street and two WWII monuments.

‘If you don’t live in a leafy suburb like Richmond,’ said the new president of the Board of Deputies, Jonathan Arkush, 1a>last week,1b> ‘you just won’t send your children to the local schools. They are rife with problems – bullying, violence, drug-taking and racism.’

In Mr Arkush’s day job he is a barrister, paid to construct clever arguments. In this statement, hidden within a double negative is a fearful view of the world outside a sealed sphere of privilege. For ‘leafy’ read affluent, for ‘local’ read working class and multi-cultural. Mr Arkush seems to believe that Jewish children can only be safe when removed from the mainstream. He speaks out against racism, but there is a disquieting undercurrent to his words that pulls in the other direction.

I wonder why Richmond escapes his gloomy view of the world. Perhaps he has friends who live there who send their children to local schools. Maybe these children are clearly happy and well-adjusted, neither bullied or bullying and manifestly drug-free. Richmond, he allows is the exception to the rule. A utopia where Jewish children are free to mingle with their non-Jewish peers, unlike the dystopian hell that rules elsewhere.